THE FOLKLORE ARCHIVES OF THE FINNISH LITERATURE SOCIETY Jouko Hautala and Urpo Vento* HISTORY The scholarly interest in Finnish folk poetry was initiated in the latter part of the 18th century by the historian, Henrik Gabriel Porthan, and his students, under the impulse given by the early romantic cur- rents. Information concerning Finnish folklore and extracts from folk- lore collections made by them or under their direction, preserved in Porthan's own works, in the academic theses written under his guid- ance, and in the manuscript of the great Finnish dictionary left by his friend, Christfrid Ganander, justify referring to these materials as the 'folklore archives of Turku Academy'. These materials would have formed an exceedingly valuable basis for the collections of the Finnish Folklore Archives . Unfortunately, all were burned in the great fire that in 1827 destroyed the entire old city of Turku. A crucial turning point in the developing of folklore studies in Finland was the founding in 1831 of the Finnish Literature Society dedi- cated to the support of cultural activitie s in the Finnish language and the promotion of research concerning the country, its traditions, and its language. From the beginning the Society has set as one of its pri- mary tasks the collecting and directing of the folklore collection, the maintenance of a folklore archives, and carrying on folklore research. (C The earliest collections held by the Finnish Folklore Archives are those made by Elias Lijnnrot whose publication of the Kalevala in 1 835 added much impetus to the collection of folklore in Finland. The group of collectors following upon his footsteps were stimulated to expressly collect ancient poems and incantations. The earliest collecting was :$This article consists of excerpts from an essay by Jouko Hautala published in full in English in the review Studia Fennica VII (1957) and additional materials offered by the present director of the Archives, Urpo Vento. naturally focused primarily on the most striking and original part of the folk heritage, that of ancient poetry and incantations. In fact, many collectors considered the essential task that of bringing to light supplementary material to the Kalevala. In the final decades of the 19th century the general change in scientific thought led to the creation of the geographic-historical meth- od of research. This method was based on the concept that lawbound evolution is involved in the geographic movement of tradition and it gave a new and powerful impulse to the work of collecting folklore. The new activity was aimed at obtaining collections of material ex- pressly for scientific research, research that no longer, as before, centered around L8nnrot's Kalevala but on original variants of folk poetry recorded from the lips of the people. The poems and incanta- tions collected we re initially published in Kalevalan toisinnot (Variants of the Kalevala) and subsesuentlv in ----Suomen Kansan Vanhat Runot (An- cient Poems of the Finnish People). Julius Krohn was the actual creator of the 'Finnish method' and his son, Kaarle Krohn, developed the method further. Of especial significance in the history of folklore research in Finland were Kaarle Krohn's extensive travels during the years 1881-85 for the purpose of collecting folklore. These collecting trips, which established the firm basis for his own career as a research scholar, brought to light in painstaking shorthand some 18,000 folklore items, including folktales, legends, poems, incantations, superstitions, magic, and other lore. In 1884 Kaarle Krohn prepared a guidebook of sixty-five pages on collecting folktales. In this guide a number of legends were brought to the attention of collectors for the first time. A guide to the collection of magic appeared as a supplement of this work. Among other collec- tors' manuals and questionnaires mention should be made of Ohjelrna suomalaisen kansanrunouden (A Program for Collectors of Finnish Folklore) which was published and distributed in a large edition in 1903 and re-issued in a revised and enlarged form in 1453. A form of collecting that subsequently proved exceedingly fruitful, namely, the organization of a collecting contest, was used for the first time in 1926, when a large scale competition for the collecting of games was held among the school children of the nation. This contest yielded approximately 129,000 items, of which 79,000 were detailed descriptions of games and sports. Martti Haavio undertook the initial responsibility for the develop- ment of the Folklore Archives of the Finnish Literature Society in 1931. He served as the first regular curator from 1934 to 1948, subsequently becoming Professor of Finnish and Comparative Folklore re search at the University of Helsinki. He stimulated another boom in folkloristic activity and at the same time steered the work of the Archives into new channels. In 1934 the Archives gained an independent status, having its own regular staff whose exclusive taskwas to augment the collections and to make them more easily accessible to scholars. Concurrent with the Kalevala centennial celebration in 1935 a well advertised public folk- lore collecting contest was organized on a vast scale, the Kalevala Jubilee Contest. Emphasis was put on those types of folklore not previously systematically collected, notably legends and memorats (reminiscences). The outcome of the contest was so astonishing that it changed to a considerable extent the total conception held until that date concerning the content and distribution of Finnish folklore. Some 130,000 items were collected. Interested citizens who had participated in the contest were formed into a network of regular contributors or agents whose number at its greatest was over a thousand. New guides to legends and local tradition were published on their behalf. From 1936 to 1939 Haavio also edited the periodical Kansantieto (Folklore) which served as a bond to hold the collection network together. The work of collecting was systematically guided in other ways as well as by means of extensive correspondence and consultation. The staff of the Archives also participated in the field work. World War 11 broke up the collectors' network. From 1948 to 1961 the curator of the Archives was Jouko Hautala and from 1961 to 1964 Lauri Simonsuuri. The collection by contests has been continued as well as expeditions by staff members of the Archives. In 1957 there was a contest devoted to the collection of folk humor concerning neigh- bor s; in 196 1, a contest involving the collecting of tales and legends for which a guidebook was written by Lauri Simonsuuri; in 1962, col- lecting of folk games. During the last years many business enterprises and organizations have sponsored, in cooperation with the Archives, competitions of collecting sayings, legends, popular medicine, etc. The periodical for inquiries, Kansantieto, has been issued twice a year since 1961. There now exists a new network of collectors consisting of approximate& 1200 persons. Of these about 300 individuals are ac- tive collectors, working regularly eGery year. Books, silver spoons, and small monetary rewards are distributed to collectors. As a result of activities in the latest phase of collecting the number of items in the Archives has once more increased tremendously. Just before the outbreak of World War I1 the Folklore Archives' staff undertook to make phonograph recordings with the equipment then The great hall of the Archives I available. More recently tape recorders have been used. The field trips for the purpose of making recordings have been carefully planned with the aim of obtaining recordings representing a maximum variety of items and in as many areas as possible before the traditions die and the different dialects merge. The result of these efforts to date has been the recording of some 1,000 nine-minute discs, all of which have been copied on tape, as well as thousands of original tape recordings. The collection of recordings in the Archives at present includes approx- imately 2,550 hours of ancient poetry, folksongs of more recent origin, incantations, laments, instrumental music, folktales, legends, etc. During the past years the Society has granted scholarships to experi- enced collectors, graduate students, and young research students for tape recording in the field. The transcription of the recordings is now underway. PRESERVATION AND CLASSIFICATION OF MATERIALS The Folklore Archives of the Finnish Literature Society have from the very beginning followed the principle that the records of individual collectors should be preserved as units, without breaking them up ac- cording to subject systems. Only in this manner is it possible to keep in sight matters important in critical examination of sources, e. g. what aspects of folklore a collector preferred; what particular tales, songs, beliefs, etc., he has specifically been seeking; which ones he has pos- sibly neglected in his search; what special points of view and details have attracted his notice; what other lore - how much and how well - his informants may have known; how reliable or unreliable or to what extent freely written from memory are his notes to be considered; etc. All the collections have been bound and placed in alphabetical order according to the names of the collectors. However, the results of cer- tain collecting contests have been arranged into uniform series without breaking up the collections of individual contestants . The material credited to each individual